Grave Misgivings

by Kristen Houghton

  “Hello, this is Melissa.” Her voice is smoky and sounds like soft crystal chimes.

  “Hi Melissa. Are you busy? I’m right near your place and if you’d like some company, I’m available.”

  “Of course, Cate. It’ll be good to see you. Come on over. I’ll buzz you in.”

  I pop another antibiotic and walk the two blocks to Melissa’s pied-a-terre. I haven’t seen Melissa since the night she helped turn me into a ‘lady of the evening’. The walking does me good; I’m tired but feel better than I did last night. What a difference a little sleep and the right medication can do!

  Melissa buzzes me in to her brownstone and I climb the stairs to her second floor where she greets me. Dressed in a silky flowing caftan she looks as perfect as always and offers me some mint tea she is making.

  “Are you going out tonight, Cate? That blue looks lovely on you,” she says surveying my outfit approvingly.

  “Stake-out,” I respond. “I’ll be tracking Romeo and his Juliet tonight around seven o’clock.” I explain about my client and her concern that her son might be with the wrong type of girl.

  “Poor boy!” Her laugh is like bells tinkling. “Well, who knows, maybe his mother is right to want to protect him. A wrong move could mess up his life.”

  We talk about what classes Melissa is taking for the upcoming summer semester, basic info on my hit man case, and Will. I hesitate, then tell her about Giles and Felicia and the jealous bitch living inside me. She smiles and tells me that’s normal and not to hate myself for simply being human. “You’re probably better off with Will, for now at least, but there is something about Dr. Giles Barrett...Don’t over think it, though.”

  Finally I tell her about my concerns for Myrtle and she listens sympathetically, offering some simple advice to let Myrtle talk to me only when she’s ready and wants to talk.

  “Don’t ask her too many questions, Cate. Let her be the one to initiate any talking. Obviously she is worried about something concerning her and Harry but let it go for now.”

  I sigh. “You’re right on all counts. So...what’s going on in your life, Melissa? Any new events to attend?” She goes to openings of art galleries, museum galas, and all the glamorous events most people can only dream about. I live vicariously through her social life.

  “Well, there is the Met’s gala next week. I haven’t decided what I want to wear to it. If I can’t find something in my closet I’ll just have to go shopping again.”

  I smile and dream. Every year the Costume Institute Gala throws an event known as the Met Ball or Met Gala. It is a yearly red carpet evening hosted by Vogue magazine that celebrates the annual opening of the Metropolitan Museum’s fashion exhibit at the Costume Institute. Two years ago Will and I were Melissa’s guests and I still remember how very handsome and hot Will looked in his tux. I didn’t look too badly myself in a low-cut jade-colored evening gown

  GRAVE MISGIVINGS 62

  that cost me way too much and now hangs in a special garment bag in the back of my closet

  begging to be worn again.

  “Come and help me look in my closet.” Melissa gets up and leads the way to the walk-in closet off of her bedroom.

  I could happily live in this closet. It is as beautifully appointed as an exclusive dress designer’s shop with comfortable cushy chairs and pristine light oak floors. There are expensive plush throw rugs by the chairs. The back wall is nothing but an array of shoes stacked floor to ceiling according to color and event or activity. Beautiful outfits hang on rods inserted into another wall and shelves and drawers on the third wall hold everything from sweaters to lingerie. This is a real woman cave. For an hour Melissa does a mini fashion show. She looks great in everything she puts on but in the end she decides that a shopping trip is in order.

  My watch says it’s almost seven o’clock and I tell Melissa to let me know when she’s going shopping. Looking at her shelves of intimate apparel, I feel a need to buy expensive silky lingerie for myself. It’s my one weakness.

  As she walks me to the door I ask her about her friend’s memorial service. I see her eyes mist over before she speaks.

  “It was a good one which honored his life and achievements. He is, was, a very decent, kind, and generous man. He should be remembered for that. I miss him.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  She hugs me and says, “So am I. Sorrier than anyone knows.”

  I head over toward Eighty-First and Fifth to begin my surveillance of two kids in puppy love.

  ๕๕๕

  It’s seven forty and I’m into my second hot pretzel with mustard when I see three teens headed toward Central Park. Two teenage boys and an older girl who is maybe eighteen or nineteen years old or so, come down the steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Pulling out the picture of the boy whose mom has hired me I determine that one of the boys is her son. Seems as if the fifteen-year-old Robbie prefers older women. They pass close by me talking and laughing as they make their way to the East Drive of the park. I follow at a discreet distance keeping them in my sight and dumping the half-eaten pretzel in a trash can.

  The trio walks deeper into the park. I’m not fond of being alone in Central Park at night and I put my hand on the gun in my pocket just to know it’s there. Obviously the teens don’t feel the same way; maybe it’s their youth. People tend to feel immortal when they’re still teenagers.

  After walking quite some distance from the entrance they finally find a spot hidden by thick bushes and trees and sit down on the grass. It’s isolated and no one else is around. I can faintly hear their music from where I stand. My phone camera is set and ready. I feel like such a scuzzy creep for spying on these kids. All the three of them are doing is listening to music and talking. Nonetheless I aim my camera trying to get a good distance shot.

  The sound of something nearby startles me and I turn around to see a possum hurrying into the brush behind me. When I look back I notice that there are only two teens now and they’re lying on the grass in an embrace. The other boy must have left the lovers so they could be

  KRISTEN HOUGHTON 63

  alone. Great. I guess Tiger-mom was right. Her baby boy is getting it on hot and heavy with this

  girl.

  Okay, sorry, this can’t be helped, kids, I think. Mom’s paying me and I need the money. God knows I’m not independently wealthy. I sneak around to one of the bushes to get near enough to get a few good shots.

  The two are really going at it so passionately that they don’t even notice when I am in a position to snap my camera. I focus my lens to shoot. A picture or two of Romeo and Juliet given to Mom and I’ll let her handle it. But instead of Romeo and Juliet, I come upon Romeo and Romeo. Tiger-mom’s son and another boy. The person who left was the girl!

  “You fucking pervert!” The voice is female.

  My phone is knocked from my hand and someone punches me hard in my mouth. I taste blood. The second punch is to my chest but as stunned as I am, I still manage to grab the person’s wrists, kick her hard in the shin, and wrestle my assailant to the ground.

  “Let go of me you bitch! You weirdo bitch!” She tries to bite my hand but I kneel on her with all my weight. She stops struggling but not yelling. “Robbie, Tony! This sicko is taking pictures of you!”

  “Shut the hell up!” I say through gritted teeth, feeling a wave of exhaustion hit me. I may feel better than last night but fighting an attacker is taxing my physical reserves. I let go and she scrambles back away from me as I stand shakily. I lean against a tree facing her, my hands balled into fists, ready in case she attacks again.

  The two boys who were on the grass come running over to us. I pull my PI license out of my pocket. They gawk at it and seem on the verge of running away.

  “Wait! You Robbie Samuelson?” I ask the boy who is the face in the picture I have from his mother.

  “Don’t answer her!” shouts the girl. “She’s a fucking pervert!”

  I turn to the girl wh
ose stare is full of venom. “You’ve got a filthy mouth, little girl. As I told you before, shut the hell up. And I’m no pervert, I’m a private investigator hired by a Mrs. Andrea Samuelson to follow her son.” I face the two boys. “Are you Robbie?”

  The boy I address looks scared and the other boy puts his face in his hands and curses.

  “My mother hired an investigator to follow me? Oh my God! How long have you been following me? Does she know about Tony? How long has she suspected me? Does she know I’m gay? Did she tell you to get some type of evidence? Oh my God! This is so fucked.”

  I shake my head at the way the three of them use such a colorful word so casually. Not that I haven’t used it myself on occasion but with most teens it seems to be a favorite word used as an adjective, adverb, and noun.

  The boy called Tony, the one who had his head in his hands suddenly looks up and grabs Robbie’s shoulder. “No way, Rob. We can go away somewhere, maybe Europe or some place. You know, some place where they can’t send you back, where they don’t, they don’t…”

  “Extradite,” I offer and all three stare at me again. “Extradition is for criminals. You haven’t committed a crime. You may be getting upset for nothing. Maybe you’re judging your

  GRAVE MISGIVINGS 64

  mother unfairly. There’s nothing wrong with being gay and she may be more understanding than

  you think.”

  “No, you don’t understand. My parents, they’re both unbelievably homophobic. They’d rather see me dead than know I’m gay!” He shakes his head. “Oh, fuck! She’ll call my dad and he’ll send me away to that military school he always talks about. She’ll have Tony brought up on charges.”

  They’re confused at the moment and that gives me an edge. I decide to take charge of the situation and tell everyone to just stop talking and pay attention. They’re kids, I’m the adult, and hopefully I can get them to listen to me by acting in a calm decisive manner.

  “Look, Robbie, I haven’t given any report to your Mom, not yet. This is the first time I’ve followed you. She called my office last week and retained my services. I was told you’d be going to study with a friend at the Met and I came here to do the job I was hired to do. Truthfully your mother thinks you’re seeing a girl and she’s afraid that you’ll get her pregnant and ruin your academic career. She found a text message from some girl on your phone.”

  They all stare at me for a few minutes and then Robbie begins to laugh. “She thinks I’m fooling around with a girl? That message was from... holy shit! It was from Tony’s sister Laurel. Oh shit, that is so...did you hear that, Tony? Your sister! God, my mother doesn’t know...”

  The girl, Laurel, steps closer to me and says, “So? What now?” Her brother and Robbie look at me questioningly. I bend to pick up my phone and put it in my pants pocket. I don’t quite know what to say to her. Turning to the two boys I say, “You kids hungry? There’s a coffee shop a block from here.”

  “What?!” says the girl in disbelief. “You’re fucking joking, right? You are a sicko!”

  I have had enough of her viciousness and before she can react I grab her shoulders. “Listen to me, you foul-mouthed little jerk. I’m trying to think a way through this situation. Robbie’s mother will be waiting for a report from me. I have to give her something. You curse at me one more time and I swear I will smash you in the mouth so hard you will swallow your teeth. I’m sick and I’m tired and you had better believe me when I tell you that that’s a volatile combination for me. I don’t give a damn what I do to someone who annoys me when I feel this badly.

  “This situation has almost nothing to do with either you or your brother Tony but I am willing to take all three of you someplace quiet to get something to eat and talk this over. You understand me or not? Just nod yes or no because I sure as hell do not want to hear you talk again.”

  She nods yes and I release my grip. I tell them to follow me to the coffee shop and to order something quick and easy. I feel like a teacher leading a group of kids on a field trip.

  Chapter 14

  ROBBIE SAMUELSON is a nice, intelligent boy. Once he calms down and understands that I’m not out to make trouble for him and that his relationship with Tony is none of my business, he is ready to discuss his, and my own, problem concerning his mother.

  “She is always after me to get good grades, to play certain sports that will appeal to college recruiters, and to be the person she thinks I should be. Very upper-class, you know? My parents are divorced and I live with my mom but my dad is still pretty involved in my life. He travels a lot for his business but Mom keeps him informed of everything I do. They both have very specific, set-in-stone goals for me. Trust me when I tell you that if either one of them finds out about me and Tony my life will be over.”

  “How did you and Tony meet?”

  “At school. Tony is a scholarship student at our school.” He looks at me quizzically and then asks, “Do you know what that is?”

  I nod. Every prep school in the city has a program where high-achieving kids who can’t afford the tuition can attend based on an academic scholarship supplied by wealthy alumni. The scholarships are vital to excellent students whose parents can’t pay the exorbitant fees charged by the prep schools.

  “Anyway, no one knows that fact except the headmaster, not even the faculty or school board know. Tony only told me because he knows he can trust me.” He smiles at Tony who smiles back shyly.

  “Why does your mom think you’re dating Laurel?”

  “Oh that. Tony used Laurel’s phone to text me because his phone got stolen last month. We’re, Tony and I, saving up to buy him a new one. I can’t let my mom know that though.” He looks at me pleadingly. “Please don’t put that in your report, please.” I shake my head and assure him I won’t.

  Tony and his sister are silent during our conversation. I’m guessing Tony is quiet because he is upset by what could happen if Robbie’s mother finds out about them. His sister Laurel doesn’t say a word. I think that she is still afraid of my threats concerning my fist slamming into her expletive-filled mouth if I hear her talk again.

  In the end, after consuming cheeseburgers, fries, and chocolate drinks, Robbie and I reach a decision. I have to give a report to his mother; that’s how I get paid. And I will truthfully tell her that Robbie is not fooling around with any girl; there’s no danger of him getting stuck being a baby-daddy or of Mrs. Samuelson entering premature grand-motherhood.

  I can tell her quite honestly that Robbie was with a boy named Tony and that they were indeed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art tonight. She’ll assume that they were working on Robbie’s art project. I will say that Tony’s older sister was helping them. I won’t mention anything else because it is immaterial to what his mother requested of me. One rule that I follow scrupulously is don’t give non-essential info to a client especially if that info can cause harm to innocent people. Robbie is guilty of nothing more than puppy love.

  I take him and Tony aside and counsel them about safe sex if their relationship does progress that far. Their young faces turn a bit red. Both boys thank me for my discretion and I pay the bill and get up to leave.

  KRISTEN HOUGHTON 66

  “Good-bye boys; don’t stay out too late. Remember that tomorrow’s a school day.” Myrtle would be proud of me. I turn to the girl, “Good-bye, Laurel, you’re one hell of a sister and a protector.”

  “You’re not so bad yourself,” she says grudgingly.

  I watch all three of them walk away up Eighty-First street before I head back toward my car. I am exhausted.

  ๕๕๕

  Having turned off both my home and cell phones, I sleep until ten o’clock the following morning and find nine messages on my phone. Three from Will, one from Giles, two from Myrtle, and one from Jennifer Brooks-Warren. There’s also an e-mail from TRUST. I go put on the coffee and listen to my phone messages first.

  Beep

  Will: “Hey, baby, call me when you get this m
essage. I am bored out of my mind at this conference and I miss my girl.”

  Beep

  Giles: “Cate, just checking in to see how you’re feeling. Called your office and Myrtle said you seemed fine. I think I may have inadvertently let her know that you were sick; she sounded surprised. Sorry about that. I’ll call later.”

  Beep

  Will: “Hey baby? You okay? I called Myrtle and she said you were on a stake-out so I’m guessing you got home really late. Call me. By the way, how sick were you and why didn’t you call me? Myrtle sounds concerned.”

  Beep

  Myrtle: “Catherine, are you all right? Why didn’t you tell me you had a virus?”

  Beep

  Will: “Okay, now I’m worried. I’m imagining you passed out on the bathroom floor with a fever of 103. Call me, baby.”

  Beep

  Myrtle: “Catherine, if I don’t hear from you, I am coming over.”

  Beep

  Giles: “Catherine, Will called me to find out how you are. Call him, please. I said you were fine but please call me too so I can be absolutely certain that you’re not still sick.”

  Beep

  Jennifer: “Cate? Just calling to thank you again.”

  My return calls, all but Myrtle’s, can wait. I grab my coffee, fix it the way I like, and sit down to watch the traffic outside my brownstone. Grabbing my cell phone I hit speed dial for Myrtle’s mobile.

  “Catherine! Where are you?”

  “I’m home, I’m fine, and I didn’t tell you I was sick because I didn’t want you worrying about me. You worry enough. I’ll be in later. I slept until ten and I feel so much better.”